Shallow Survey 2022 Challenges

The Shallow Survey conference committee is proud to announce the Shallow Survey Challenges. The Challenges are based on Themes which aim to encourage innovation and collaboration between research organisations, academia, the survey industry, and equipment manufacturers to address some of the difficulties faced when surveying in a shallow water coastal environment. 

The challenges will investigate technologies or methodologies which provide solutions to working in the coastal and shallow water environment. Examples of the techniques that may be used for the data acquisition vary from beam forming sonars, LIDAR, Satellite Derived Bathymetry, seafloor sampling robots, seismic acquisition, autonomous technologies or motion compensation systems.

Participants are encouraged to acquire survey datasets over any or all of the four-challenge areas located in New Zealand’s iconic Marlborough Sounds. This data can be shared with the academic, industry and survey community via the Shallow Survey website.  

Challenge areas have been selected to represent the survey environments that may be encountered in a shallow water or coastal survey. These are rocky biologically significant areas, ports and harbours, shallow water estuarine areas, and wrecks and sea floor features. Examples of the outcomes from the challenges may be:

• an exploration of advantages for an acquisition system or technology such as cost point, acquisition outputs, deliverables, ease of deployment, data integrity or survey efficiency;
  
• an investigation into the benefits of using a processing methodology;
  
• an exploration of the hydrographic or science products that can be produced from the survey systems; 
  
• surveying shallow embayment’s where survey techniques such as SDB, LIDAR, drone, interferometric sonars, shore operated sampling systems, AUV can be used to increase acquisition efficiency;
  
• defining watercolumn features (e.g. seeps, kelp, fish stocks) using sonar backscatter, or remote sampling technologies such as AUV or glider;
  
• exploring rocky reef areas inaccessible to traditional survey craft;
  
• an exploration of marine habitat;
  
• surveying steeply sloping seafloors with challenging topologies;
  
• using innovative technologies in swell or current affected areas where motion artefacts influence the acquired data.
  

If you are planning to undertake a challenge, please contact the conference organiser as soon as possible providing an outline of your proposal. Acquisition is set to end June 2020.

All data collection must be notified to the conference in advance. We will assist in arranging survey vessels, permits, accommodation and the freight of the survey systems to the area. 

Survey datasets should be delivered to the conference organiser by August 2021 so they can shared with the shallow survey community to analyse and present at the conference. 

We also encourage groups to partner in advance. Contact the conference organiser to register your interest in forming a multi-disciplinary collaborative team. 

We expect participants undertaking Challenges to present their findings at the Shallow Survey Conference in May 2022.

The Challenge Areas

1. Ports and harbours
Picton Harbour and the neighboring Waikawa Bay are the main ports in the Marlborough Sounds. This area provides a variety of man-made features that ideal to survey, including: seawalls, wharf infrastructure, and boat moorings. Picton Harbour and Waikawa Bay are surrounded by hills, with seafloors the steeply slope down to the bottom of the sound. The slopes of the bays comprise of small rocky reefs and unconsolidated rock that fines as it deepens. The seafloor of the sound is comprised of the fine-sandy mud. There are many features on the seafloor of the sound, including, decimetre to metre-scale pockmarks, dredge marks, anchor scours, and trenches from submarine cables. Outer Picton Harbour has been observed to have and active seep system that is linked to the pockmarks and can be detected in multibeam water column data. Evidence suggests that these seeps are freshwater origin. The area provides a wide range of backscatter variability with the seafloor including areas of hard rock, gravels, sands and mud.

2. Rocky biologically significant area
The area around Scraggy Point and Thoms Bay, on the southern shores of outer Tory Channel, is an area of rich biodiversity. The area has small headlands that have rocky reefs that extend all the way to the floor of Tory Channel. The bays between the headlands consist of coarse unconsolidated rock the gradually fines as it deepens. The area has a coastal belt of kelp that reach the surface and is a habitat for many species. Underlying the kelp are beds of medium and low standing macroalgae. These kelps and macroalgae can be detected in multibeam water column data. Two areas of Marine Ecological Significance as identified by the Marlborough District Council exist in this area: bryozoan beds on the rocky reefs; and eel grass beds in the neighboring bays. The area provides a wide range of backscatter variability with the seafloor including areas of hard rock, gravels, sands and mud. The waters are usually quite clear with good visibility and are affected by strong tidal flows.

3. Shallow water estuarine area
Grove Arm is the uppermost reach of Queen Charlotte Sound. This bay has a large area of gently sloping shallow water at the head and has a variety of man-made objects to survey, including jetties and boat moorings. The seafloor comprises of fine sandy mud and as many decimeter-scale pockmarks. Suitable for LIDAR and UAV surveying as well as Interferometric sonars.

4. Wrecks and sea floor features area
Kaipapa Bay is a bay on the end on a headland on the northern side on inner Queen Charlotte Sound. The coastline around the bay has nearshore rocky reefs that become unconsolidated rock as the seafloor deepens. Kaipapa Bay is bounded by Golden Point and Kumutoto Point. At the base of the seafloor slope around these points are large 10-metre scale pockmarks and scour holes. There have been seeps detected here using multibeam water column data. Evidence suggests that these seeps are freshwater origin. There are two wrecks in this area. The first, is a wooden barge of Kumutoto Point. This barge provides a habitat to a rich assemblage of species, including bryozoan, tube worms, and fish. The second wreck is that of a fully rigged yacht that sits off Golden Point. This yacht sits upright on the edge on a large pockmark and its mast and stays may be detected by multibeam water column data.